In an October 2024 post on Instagram, St. Olaf College highlighted its ranking as #16 for best dining. This assessment came from The Princeton Review, a well-known, highly-regarded provider of college admissions resources.
Stav Hall is well-known for its diverse set of dining station options as well as its commitment to farm-to-fork connections. According to Bon Appétit, St. Olaf sources 20% of its produce from local farms within 150 miles of the college. Students have access to food sourced from STOGrow, the on-campus farm, in addition to other farms neighboring St. Olaf and Northfield. St. Olaf has consistently been ranked in the top 20 for dining in The Princeton Review and has received recognition from other food review sites such as The Daily Meal and Food and Wine.
To better understand how St. Olaf earned this ranking, it’s important to understand how The Princeton Review compiles its information. The Princeton Review relies on their own student-based data collected through an extensive annual poll containing a wide variety of questions about student life. One question asks “how do you rate the food on campus?” The Princeton Review assigns each college a score based on student responses, which then are used to rank St. Olaf against other colleges’ accordingly.
While the title has received positive recognition, some uncertainties remain. The Princeton Review does not report the specific number of survey responses from each school or their demographics. However, each school typically has an average of around 490 student participants, according to Jeanne Krier, a publicist at the Princeton Review. This would be about 16% of the St. Olaf student body.
